Adidas: Breaking The Pattern With Adidas Glitch [image] 6

Credits & Description:

Entrant: Iris, London
Brand: Adidas
Corporate Name of Client: adidas
Global Communications Manager - Special Projects: Miriam Keck
Director Business Development: Marc Makowski
Group Planning Director: Michael Barrett
Senior Manager Digital Experience: Hans-Erc Noyons
Business Director: Von Branton
Agency Account Executive: Jasmina Cigoja
Managing Partner: Nico Tuppen
Agency: iris, London
Creative Director: Iain Robson
Senior Copywriter: Ric Blank
Senior Art Director: Tarik Bedevi
Agency Producer: Laura Jane Justice
Project Manager: Julia Sz.Kis
Digital Company: POSSIBLE, London
Executive Creative Director: Pablo Marques
Senior Designer: Mariana Lobos
Design Director: Wojciech Zalot
Technical Creative Director: Stuart Thorne
Lead Mobile Developer: Peter Schmiz
UXD Director: Pontus Persson
Senior UI Developer: Istvan Makary
Digital Designer: Jose Paz
Senior Motion Design: Laszlo Szekeres
Synopsis:
Start-up culture is ripe with experimentation and originality. Risk breeds creativity. But… If you’re a successful, well established company like adidas how do you break with tradition and reap the benefits of change? By behaving like a start-up and breaking all your own rules. We said no to stores and built an app to launch the product. Made it mobile first & invite only. No ads. No media. No big player. We said yes to co-creating social and digital content with influencers. Yes to exclusivity & community. Together, we transformed one of football's most recognizable brands into one of its hottest start-ups.
Football is changing – the new breed of player is found in small squads and urban academies. Their idols aren’t premiership players, but freestylers: players that get as much respect for their style of play as their ability to win. This audience isn’t watching TV, following pro-players or reading magazines. They’re on their phones, on the move, watching YouTube, learning tricks and sharing their skills. They can’t be won over by the usual marketing mix, we had to find a new way to connect. So we put the influencers and our mobile technology at the heart of the strategy. Launching without any media spend or ads, no big star player and no shops or online stores. Launching with unique and highly relevant social and digital content, created by peers, influencers and home-grown football talent in their city. And doing it all through a mobile device that they take with them everywhere.
We intentionally started small, with a core group of influencers and urban footballers in London, chosen as the gatekeepers of GLITCH. This allowed the community to grow gradually and organically. By making it exclusive and limited in number, the customer experience was more personal. Players could book an appointment to try the boots on the pitch (via the app), joined by influencers and fitting advisors. We fed our audience’s desire for instant gratification by making the purchasing process quick and seamless. Boots could be bought on the move and delivered within 4 hours, anywhere in London. There was 24 hour chat support from the same influencers who were there from the start, with rewards for the most active users. The app held key customer data and preferences, allowing players to order fresh new designs on release. And it facilitated a three-way dialogue between the brand, the influencers and its customers.
GLITCH trended immediately and boots were in demand from day one. Players took to social media begging for referral codes from their contacts. We made it into the ‘HOT this week’ list in the Apple app store in our first week. We even saw access codes being sold on eBay. Despite the controlled release, the GLITCH app has had over 50 thousand downloads in the first four months. The codes seeded by our first influencers had a 75% conversion rate to a boot sale and we’ve continued to see an 89% redemption rate on codes being activated. All without a scrap of media spend, zero advertising or sponsorship & no celebrity endorsement. GLITCH managed to transform one of football's most recognisable brands into one of its hottest start-ups. It turned the industry upside down, creating a completely new and loyal relationship between a brand and consumer.